The much awaited NATO summit will begin today which will be discussing afghan war end game, lets see what comes out from this especially for Pakistan.
Re: NATO summit
at the moment there are protests going on the eve of NATO summit! everyone is sick of this so called war on terror!
Re: NATO summit
President Zardari may face friction over supply routes | DAWN.COM
**CHICAGO: Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari arrived in Chicago on Saturday for a Nato summit to what could be a chilly reception if a hoped-for deal allowing trucks to again supply alliance troops in Afghanistan fails to materialize.
**
While Western officials sought to portray Zardari’s presence as a sign of improving Nato-Pakistan ties, possible friction at the meeting underscores the challenges Nato countries face as they struggle to ensure a stable future for Afghanistan after Western toops withdraw.
Western leaders, who sometimes differ in their visions for the best way to end the war, speak with one voice when they describe Pakistan as the lynchpin to Afghanistan’s future security – or continued conflict.
**“We can’t solve the problems in Afghanistan without a positive engagement of Pakistan,” Nato Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said hours before Zardari’s arrival, repeating a refrain from Nato leaders that Pakistan must do more to act against militants who launch attacks from the country’s tribal areas.
**
Zardari’s decision to accept a last-minute invitation to attend the summit in President Barack Obama’s home town was an abrupt reversal after months of diplomatic estrangement.
Islamabad had made clear that Obama’s top aides were not welcome in Pakistan.
It was also initially seen as a sign that Islamabad was on the verge of reopening supply routes through Pakistan that are crucial for Nato troops in Afghanistan.
But now it is far from clear that a deal on those supply lines is imminent.
**“It is time for them to make a decision,” said a US official. “Patience is not exhausted but it’s wearing thinner on the US side.”
**In a sign of US frustration, the White House said this week that Obama had no plans to meet with Zardari individually, although he is scheduled to meet with Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
A RIFT NOT YET HEALED
Pakistan closed the supply routes in November after US aircraft killed 24 of its soldiers along the border with Afghanistan. The incident caused a rift with the United States that has not yet healed as the White House, gearing up for November elections, has rebuffed Pakistan’s demands for an apology.
The US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there have been no breakthroughs in talks on the supply routes that many in the Obama administration had hoped would yield an agreement at the summit, which begins on Sunday.
Yet US and Nato officials said the mere fact that Zardari would attend is a step forward.
“Obviously it’s important that they are taking part in the summit as it’s a big show of support for Afghanistan,” said Nato spokeswoman Oana Lungescu.
The Obama administration is eager to resume more productive ties with Pakistan, whose role will be even more crucial as Nato combat troops begin to withdraw ahead of a 2014 deadline.
“The goal is to re-establish a sense of normalcy in the relationship and we’re getting there. It will take time,” the US official said.
The Obama administration accuses Pakistan of sheltering militants who attack Karzai’s government and Nato troops.
Pakistan sees Afghanistan as vital to its security concerns, and wants a say in the country’s future.
Islamabad defends its role in combating militants and notes that many of its own soldiers have died in that fight.
“The point here is that Pakistan has cooperated in every effort to hunt down, degrade, destroy and disable al Qaeda. And your military acknowledges that,” Sherry Rehman, Pakistani ambassador to the United States, told CNN on Friday.
Zardari’s government has voiced its willingness to reopen the supply routes – if an agreement can be reached on fees that will be paid on each shipment going into Afghanistan.
In an interview with the Chicago Tribune, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said it was unlikely the United States would accept Pakistani requests to pay as much as $5,000 per military shipment going into Afghanistan.
Re: NATO summit
Re: NATO summit
In an interview with the Chicago Tribune, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said it was unlikely the United States would accept Pakistani requests to pay as much as $5,000 per military shipment going into Afghanistan.
Panetta said he would be discussing the supply route issue with Pakistan one-on-one. Since Panetta is the defence secretary of the US, I hope he would be able to discuss the issue only with his Pakistani counterpart Chudhry Ahmed Mukhtar, not the President of Pakistan.
Re: NATO summit
NATO Summit demonstrations peaceful despite terrorist charges - latimes.com
On the day three men were charged with conspiracy to commit terrorism at President Obama’s campaign headquarters and other Chicago-area sites, protests on the first day of the NATO summiton Saturday have been vigorous and noisy but largely peaceful. Frequent updates from the Chicago Tribune website show that about 30 people came out in support of the three men arrested Wednesday on suspicion of planning to hit President Obama’s campaign headquarters, Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s house and police stations with Molotov cocktails.
Brian Church, 22, of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., Jared Chase, 27, of Keene, N.H., and Brent Vincent Betterly, 24, of Massachusetts, were being held on $1.5-million bail each, Chicago Police spokeswoman Melissa Stratton told the Los Angeles Times Saturday.The National Lawyers Guild, which is representing the men, said they were
NATO protesters with equipment for making beer, not bombs, in the apartment where they were staying, the Tribunereported.
In another part of town, about 200 people canvassed Emanuel’s neighborhood to protest mental health clinic closures before marching past his house, Stratton said.
Demonstrators shared their personal stories and reasons for protesting. Diane Adams, 56, said she received counseling and medication after trying to commit suicide after her son was murdered in 2005, the Tribune reported.
The mental health care center where she received treatment is now closed, and she urged the crowd to contact the mayor and local aldermen to demand that funding be restored.“You can find money for everything else but not mental health?” the Tribune reported Adams as saying. "We’re the ones that need it. We’re not here to upset nobody. We’re here to fight for what we deserve."Chicago police on Saturday arrested 14 people in protest-related incidents, mostly cases of civil disobedience. Stratton characterized them as voluntary arrests. “Our officers have been preparing for this event for 11 months and we’ve been planning for all scenarios. We have helped facilitate peaceful protests while being intolerant of criminal behavior,” Stratton said.The marches remained peaceful throughout Saturday afternoon. More protests are planned for Sunday.
Re: NATO summit
Panetta said he would be discussing the supply route issue with Pakistan one-on-one. Since Panetta is the defence secretary of the US, I hope he would be able to discuss the issue only with his Pakistani counterpart Chudhry Ahmed Mukhtar, not the President of Pakistan.
they will have the supply routes open on their terms, maybe a little bit more than the $200 they were paying before their closure.
Re: NATO summit
Purani tankhuwa par hi kaam karna parrey ga? :bummber:
Re: NATO summit
Panetta said he would be discussing the supply route issue with Pakistan one-on-one. Since Panetta is the defence secretary of the US, I hope he would be able to discuss the issue only with his Pakistani counterpart Chudhry Ahmed Mukhtar, not the President of Pakistan.
they will have the supply routes open on their terms, maybe a little bit more than the $200 they were paying before their closure.
By the way, I was talking about this meeting from protocol point of view. If anyone is interested, it should be Obama discussing with Zardari on-on-one, not the US defence secretary with Pakistani president one-on-one.
Re: NATO summit
there is a Zardari-Obama one on one meeting scheduled but it might not go ahead if the NATO supplies are not restored by that time.
Re: NATO summit
I don’t think a one-on-one meeting is planned in any case.
Obama will ‘see’ Zardari, not meet him | Zee News
Obama not to meet Zardari, to see Karzai | The Financial Daily
Obama, Zardari to meet in group sessions | Pakistan Today
Obama will not meet one-on-one with Pakistan president | McClatchy
Re: NATO summit
That shows Pakistani importance in the grand scheme of things. This war has made Pakistan "na ghar kay na ghaat kay"
Re: NATO summit
NATO summit opens against backdrop of protests, foiled terror plot - CNN.com
Chicago (CNN) – The road map out of the war in Afghanistan is expected to be drawn up by U.S. President Barack Obama and other world leaders when they gather Sunday at the NATO summit in Chicago.
Against a backdrop of massive protests – and a foiled, homegrown terror plot that targeted Obama and others – the summit will open with NATO countries trying to figure out how to meet a 2014 withdrawal from an unpopular war while shoring up Afghanistan’s security forces.
Security is expected to be tight at the summit following the arrest of three men, described by authorities as anarchists who plotted to attack Obama’s Chicago campaign headquarters and lob Molotov cocktails at police during the summit.
Police insist there are no imminent threats to the leaders of more than 50 nations gathering at the summit.The leaders are expected to formally adopt a timetable to transition security from the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force to Afghan forces, senior administration officials told CNN.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity as a matter of practice, said the plan will also lay out NATO’s training and advisory role after 2014.
One of the key issues to be considered by the NATO leaders is who will pay for the buildup of Afghan forces as ISAF draws down its troops. Afghan security forces are expected to total 350,000 by 2015, according to CNN National Security Analyst Peter Bergen.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who is attending the summit along with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, can only afford to cover a fraction of the cost of building up his country’s forces. The cost of building up forces is expected to total roughly $4 billion annually by 2014, Bergen said.
France’s new president, Francois Hollande, is widely expected to announce the withdrawal of French troops from Afghanistan by year’s end.
Also, at issue at the NATO summit, is Islamabad’s continued blockade of much-needed NATO supplies shipped over Pakistani roads to Afghanistan.
Pakistan closed the ground routes after a NATO airstrike in November killed two dozen of its soldiers. NATO insists the incident was an accident.
**The United States and NATO are unlikely to reach an agreement with Pakistan at the summit, according to two senior U.S. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the subject.
“There is no deal, and there won’t be one until President Zardari returns” to Pakistan, one of the officials said. “And even that is not assured.”
The goal, says the official, “is to get a deal. It’s less important as to when.”
Without a deal, the officials said Obama would not meet with Zardari at the summit. The two are scheduled to hold trilateral talks with Karzai on political reconciliation in Afghanistan. Pakistan’s support in reaching a deal with the Taliban is seen as critical in ending the war in Afghanistan.
Outside the summit, Chicago authorities expect to have their hands full with protests.
**
On Saturday, the eve of the summit, Occupy Chicago protesters accused police of running down one of their own with a patrol van. A video, posted online by a protester and picked up by a news organization, appeared to show the van bumping a protestor.
But a spokesman for Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel said the driver of the van was responding to an attack by the protester.
“The individual was attacking the van and trying to slash tires on it with a knife as the van was moving slowly through a crowd,” spokesman Bill McCaffrey told CNN.
He said the person successfully slashed the tires, and then fled.
Re: NATO summit
Pakistan not interested in the afghan war solution, I think more important are the $$
Re: NATO summit
we already know the outcome of this summit :hinna:
Re: NATO summit
money speaks louder than actions and words!
Re: NATO summit
NATO is going to give a piece of its mind to Zardari on Pak Army-Taliban contacts. While Zardari will be there with a begging bowl, asking for remuneration for its services, world leaders will again be casting doubts on Pakistan’s commitment to the war on terror. A promise of clearance of dues will be termed a huge success of Zardari and that’s all we will be getting out of this summit.
By the way, I hope he doesn’t fix Benazir’s portrait on the lectern 
Re: NATO summit
phir naak katwa di… :hmmm:
At NATO summit, warm welcome for most leaders, but not Pakistan’s - latimes.com
CHICAGO — As thousands of protesters marched in the streets, President Obama welcomed more than 60 world leaders to his heavily guarded home town for a
NATO summit that will start the clock for America and its allies to begin pulling combat troops from Afghanistan.
The two-day summit, the largest in the 63-year history of the military alliance, came as White House officials made it clear they were furious over Pakistan’s continued refusal to reopen ground routes used to move fuel and other war supplies into Afghanistan, a six-month stand-off that the White House had hoped to resolve before Obama arrived in Chicago.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton met with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari on the sidelines of the summit Sunday. But White House officials ruled out a meeting between Obama and Zardari, and NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen canceled a meeting with the Pakistani leader, citing scheduling conflicts.
Aides said Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta planned to meet with officials from five Central Asian countries that have provided an alternative, but considerably more expensive, northern land route for NATO supplies since Pakistan closed its roads after U.S. airstrikes killed 24 Pakistani soldiers in November.
**After weeks of closed-door negotiations with Zardari’s government, U.S. officials did not deny that they are seeking to send the Pakistanis a public message.
“If they’re feeling a little bit of pressure this weekend, they should,” said a U.S. official, who requested anonymity because of diplomatic sensitivities. “The U.S. and NATO are ready to move beyond this issue.”**
During the summit, North Atlantic Treaty Organization nations are expected to ratify a U.S.-backed plan to withdraw most of the 130,000 foreign troops by the end of 2014 and then provide the government in Kabul with billions of dollars in military aid to battle the Taliban insurgency.
In his opening remarks, Obama said he looked forward to when the war “as we understand it is over.” The ambiguous message reflects his determination to end U.S. involvement in an unpopular war as he runs for reelection, even though years of tough fighting probably lie ahead for Afghans.
Mounting economic turmoil around the globe, and the growing sense that 11 years of war is enough, produced powerful undercurrents of tension amid a facade of unity.
The alliance is split on key details about how to prevent Afghanistan from falling under Taliban control once NATO troops leave. There were clear signs of discord over how quickly to pull troops out over the next 2 1/2 years, and growing doubts about whether NATO nations will meet financial pledges in the future.
“We still have a lot of work to do and there will be great challenges ahead,” Obama told reporters after meeting for more than an hour with Afghan President
Hamid Karzai. “The loss of life continues in Afghanistan and there will be hard days ahead.”
One of the challenges is from an ally. Pakistan closed its roads to trucks that deliver food, fuel and other nonlethal supplies to NATO forces in Afghanistan after the U.S. airstrikes on Nov. 26. Pakistan called the attacks unprovoked and deliberate, but U.S. officials insisted they were an error. The incident capped months of crises that added intense pressures to the long-fraught relationship between Washington and Islamabad.
Pakistan recently demanded that the United States and NATO pay more than $5,000 for each truck entering its territory, a substantial increase over the previous $200 charge. In an interview last week, Panetta all but ruled out paying that much, although U.S. officials are willing to pay a higher rate than before to reopen the supply route from the port of Karachi to the Afghan border.
If Pakistan doesn’t reopen the routes, NATO will face additional difficulties and expenses as it seeks to withdraw combat forces and military equipment from Afghanistan.
Inside Chicago’s McCormick Place, a cavernous convention center, the summit began with Obama and other leaders seated at a vast circular table. They stood at attention as uniformed service members from the 28 NATO nations solemnly marched in, and a drummer beat cadence. Obama bowed his head as the gathering observed a moment of silence to honor troops killed or injured in NATO operations, and a bugler played taps.
Several thousand antiwar and other demonstrators took to the streets for mostly peaceful protests, chanting “No NATO, no way!” and “Hey hey, ho ho, NATO has got to go!” In the late afternoon, knots of protesters scuffled with police in helmets and black body armor, but officers used billy clubs and shields to push them back.
At least 20 people were reported arrested during the day. But the protests were far smaller and less violent than what many people in Chicago, a city still deeply scarred by memories of bloody confrontations during the 1968 Democratic National Convention, had feared.
Since approving the deployment of 30,000 additional troops in 2010, Obama has steadily reduced his definition of success in Afghanistan. At a briefing Sunday, White House officials described the U.S. goals as modest and narrow: defeating Al Qaeda and preventing the terrorist network from taking root again.
Ben Rhodes, deputy national security advisor for strategic communication, said the aim is not to leave Afghanistan “eradicated of any vestige of the Taliban or any vestiges of some form of violence. It’s leaving behind an Afghanistan that can stand on its own two feet… And so that’s the goal we’re planning against and we’re confident that we can achieve it.”
Under the NATO plan, Afghanistan’s army and police will take over the lead combat role in the summer of 2013. Gen. John Allen, commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan, warned, however, that substantial fighting is still likely beyond then, especially against Taliban insurgents, militants from the Pakistani-based
Haqqani network and a small number of Al Qaeda members in eastern Afghanistan.
“There is a narrative that combat operations for the U.S. stop at milestone 2013,” Allen said. “That is not, in fact, correct. We fully expect that combat is going to continue.”
But the mid-2013 shift may also spur some countries to leave. Nervous European allies may start withdrawing troops well before the end of 2014. France is expected to pull most of its 3,300 troops out by the end of this year, but leave small numbers of military personnel as trainers or in other support roles. The Netherlands and Canada already have sharply reduced their combat roles.
Obama has not said how quickly U.S. troops will leave Afghanistan. The current force of about 90,000 is due to drop to 68,000 by the fall. The pace of later withdrawals is not yet decided, though Obama has said the pullout will be steady.
Officials also have not resolved who will pay for Afghanistan’s long-term development, although they say they are making progress. The Obama administration has offered to pay about half the estimated $4.1 billion per year required for the Afghan national security forces after 2014. Afghanistan has agreed to pay $500 million, while Germany, Britain, Australia and others have made commitments totaling more than $400 million. Other countries have yet to make up the difference.
“We are very, very close to obtaining our full goal,” said Douglas E. Lute, special assistant to the president on Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Though Afghanistan is dominating the session, the alliance also gave final approval to several other initiatives, including plans to buy five unarmed Global Hawk surveillance drones and declaring an interim capability for a basic missile defense system in Europe.
The missile defense system consists of several U.S. guided-missile cruisers in the eastern Mediterranean and a sophisticated radar system in Turkey. They provide a limited ability to shoot down short- and medium-range missiles from Iran, officials say.
Rasmussen, the head of NATO, said he was hopeful that Russia, which has strongly objected to the system, would agree to a joint antimissile effort. But Russian officials have given no sign of changing course and did not attend the summit.
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[EMAIL=“[email protected]”][email protected]
Chicago Tribune staff writer Wailin Wong contributed to this report.
Re: NATO summit
NATO summit kay baad bijle bahaal ho jaye gee?
Re: NATO summit
NATO summit kay baad bijle bahaal ho jaye gee?
If they get some amount from the summit they might dish some towards the electorates to try and win some votes in the next elections.